Anderson@Large

Race and Smiley Faces

I have long since tuned out the Sunday talk shows. But yesterday I tuned in to “Meet the Press” because my friend, Harvard Law Prof. Charles Ogletree, was invited to participate in a roundtable discussion on "Race and Justice in America."

The other panel members were Congressional Black Caucus Chair Marcia Fudge, Marc Morial, Michael Steele and Tavis Smiley.

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With all due respect to Ogletree, black folks know Obama is not “the black president.” That said, African American voters did not turn out in record numbers in 2008 and 2012 to vote for a candidate who “happens to be black.” While they don’t want Obama to “simply focus on one issue,” they do want him to focus on issues that disproportionately impact them.

As they say, a broken clock is right twice a day. Smiley rightly noted that Presidents Lincoln, Truman and Johnson addressed the issue of race. He also noted that Obama has addressed gay marriage, an issue of importance to the LGBT community.

I think Obama should be held to the same standard of accountability as previous occupants of the Oval Office. But Smiley’s criticism that Obama “was pushed” is mindless:

He did not walk to the podium for an impromptu address to the nation; he was pushed to that podium. A week of protest outside the White House, pressure building on him inside the White House pushed him to that podium. So I'm glad he finally arrived.

Smiley fancies himself a student of history so he should be mindful of President Roosevelt’s call to action:

I agree with you, I want to do it, now make me do it.

Gays, Hispanics, Jewish Americans and other groups “made” Obama address their concerns by staying engaged beyond Election Day. They embraced the lessons of our history and continued to “agitate, agitate.”

As for Tavis, history tells us that “smiling faces sometimes they don’t tell the truth.”

Familiarity Breeds Contempt

President Obama’s fiery comments before the Congressional Black Caucus continue to reverberate.

White House spokesman Kevin Lewis told The Huffington Post’s Black Voices Obama was not calling out his critics; rather, his speech was a call to arms:

I think at the end of the day, the president is familiar with criticism. It is nothing new to him. And I think the president’s remarks are being mischaracterized. I think what the president was saying was that he’s fighting for a lot of the folks that were in that room and fighting for the American people and calling on not only the CBC but lawmakers and folks who are in the room and across the country to join him.

Still, PBS talk show host Tavis Smiley is up in arms.

Smiley asked Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee whether Obama would ever say to Hispanics, Wall Street bankers fraudsters, Jews, gays and lesbians, “Stop grumbling, stop complaining, stop crying”:

How does he get away with saying this to black folk when he would never form his lips to ever say that to any other constituency?

Jackson Lee responded:

I think familiarity is the answer to your question. The president came and put on the armor of a brother and sister.

I make no excuse for some of those comments when you look back and wonder whether they were said in love. Whether they were said to your brother who’s sitting next to you who’s been having a hard time and you’re trying to pump up your brother or your sister. And you’re saying, “Come on now. You can do better than this. We’re not complaining.”

The congresswoman made it clear she intends to speak out on behalf of brothers and sisters who are facing hard times:

I will continue to articulate complaint, pain and despair.

Too Important to Fail

I will blog about the forum on STEM education that I attended yesterday at the Brookings Institution, at which Acting Commerce Secretary Rebecca Blank unveiled a report, “Education Supports Racial and Ethnic Equality in STEM.”

But right now, I want to focus on a national initiative to stem the high school drop crisis among black boys, Too Important to Fail.

Tonight at 8:00 p.m. EDT, PBS will air Tavis Smiley Reports’ “Too Important to Fail,” an investigation of the root causes of education crisis.

To check your local listings, go here.

What About Urban America?

It’s Day Two of President Obama’s economic bus tour.

President Obama and members of the White House Rural Council will attend a rural economic forum at Northeast Iowa Community College in Peosta, Iowa, where Obama will deliver remarks.

The president will unveil a new jobs initiative for rural America. In a statement, Obama said:

These are tough times for a lot of Americans – including those who live in our rural communities. That’s why my administration has put a special focus on helping rural families find jobs, grow their businesses, and regain a sense of economic security.

But what about those who live in urban communities? Where is the special focus on helping urban families?

The lack of administration attention to the jobless crisis in black urban America is fueling a black family feud.

Longtime journalist William Reed writes:

“Cornel West and Tavis Smiley are doing a so-called poverty bus tour under the guise of highlighting that issue … check their records [and] you will see that they have done a lot of poverty-pimping through book sales, TV appearances, speaking fees and promoting the ‘woe is me mindset’… this has been their hustle for a long time.’’ That’s Steve Harvey’s rant in the most recent round of Black American disc jockeys and broadcasters’ battle to brook no criticism of Barack Hussein Obama.

Conscientious Black Americans would do well to compare Harvey’s rhetoric to Obama’s results as president before arbitrarily choosing sides in this public spat. Tavis Smiley and Cornel West are being pilloried and made out to be “pariahs” by Black jocks because they’ve made negative comments about Obama’s presidential performance. But Black American DJs seem to be dodging the fact that America’s economy is in free-fall; the country’s deficits, debt and government spending are at a record high, and our credit rating has been downgraded for the first time in history. In spite of these obvious presidential shortcomings, Urban Contemporary broadcasters continue “praising Caesar” and pummeling his critics. As other American groups lament America’s economic plight, Black Americans, whose lifestyles and conditions are the worst of all, still defend Obama’s lackluster job performance.

Similarly, Newsweek reports:

Never mind the slings and arrows of Tea Partiers. The most politically problematic criticism of Obama these days is coming from his base. And there’s no question that there is a deep reservoir of frustration, confusion, and even rage among many in the African-American community for [Cornel] West to tap into. With unemployment hovering near 17 percent for African-Americans (the national average rate is 9 percent) and 11 percent of black homeowners facing imminent foreclosure, African-Americans have ample reason for anxiety about the coming budget cuts that Obama reluctantly signed into law this month. The Congressional Black Caucus chairman called the recent debt deal “a sugar-coated satan sandwich” that will do little to help communities already struggling.

West and his longtime friend, radio host Tavis Smiley, have taken their criticism of Obama to the streets, launching a two-week, 15-city “poverty tour,” aimed at forcing the powers that be to once again focus on the “least among us” and getting the president to “wake up.” Their efforts are increasingly stoking fears among some African-American leaders that West and Smiley could discourage black voters from turning out when the nation’s first African-American president stands for reelection in 2012.

Read more: The Black War Over Obama

UPDATE: At a breakfast with small business owners, President Obama announced his new jobs initiatives for rural America.

Bus Stops

President Obama’s harshest critics, Tavis Smiley and Cornel West, are on a 15-city poverty tour.

During an appearance on CNN, Smiley said the debt ceiling deal “was really a declaration of war on the poor. The Congress, the President, respectfully, declared war on the poor.”

In Detroit, Obama supporters declared war on the, um, dynamic duo.

David Stephen told the local ABC TV affiliate:

We will not stand silent as Smiley and West criticize the man who brought us health care reform, one of the greatest accomplishments for the poor in our nation’s history. This event has nothing to do with the poor and everything to do with enriching Tavis Smiley. Detroit must send a strong message to Washington that although some elected officials may support this anti-Obama rally on government property, the people do not.

Meanwhile, the Washington Post reports:

More than a year ago Smiley and West went rogue on Obama, fomenting bitter, public fights with allies of the president that have resulted in name-calling and shouting matches. The two men, who are best friends and have long been concerned with the state of blacks in America, described the tour — which is not solely focused on blacks — as an attempt to force the White House and Congress to pay more attention the poor.

For more info, visit The Poverty Tour: A Call to Conscience.

National Urban League Centennial Conference

The National Urban League kicks off its annual conference today in DC.

I will not be there for the opening session. In fact, I do not plan to attend any of the plenary sessions, workshops, etc.

This image tells me all I need to know about the “State of Black America.”

Click Image to Enlarge

I thought it was wrong for Tavis Smiley and the NAACP to accept Wells Fargo’s tainted money.

It’s a sign of the times that a social service organization is sponsored by, among others, a bailed-out predatory lender and an oil company that’s responsible for the worst environmental disaster in U.S. history.

BP can afford to be generous since American taxpayers will partly foot the bill for the fund established to compensate victims of the oil spill.

And let’s not forget the NAACP blasted BP for its response to the oil spill and has accused it of discriminating against “workers of color” and “contractors of color.”

They say consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds. So shoot me. I have a small mind.

UPDATE: The Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission has accused Wells Fargo of engaging in predatory lending practices in black neighborhoods in Philadelphia.

NAACP Hooks Up With Wells Fargo

In 2007, I applauded when the NAACP filed a class action lawsuit against 15 of the nation’s largest subprime lenders for “systematic, institutionalized racism in sub-prime home mortgage lending.”

The defendants included Wells Fargo Bank & Company.

Though Well Fargo’s role in the subprime mortgage scheme was well-known, the predatory lender was the “title sponsor” of Tavis Smiley’s annual talkfest.

Smiley claimed ignorance. He finally severed his ties with Wells Fargo when the glare of media spotlight got too hot.

NAACP President and CEO Benjamin Jealous was an outspoken critic of Wells Fargo. So you can imagine my surprise when earlier this month, I read the NAACP dropped its lawsuit against the predatory lender:

The NAACP announced today that it is ending its lawsuit against Wells Fargo Bank, N.A. Since 2007, the NAACP has filed lawsuits against more than a dozen of the largest financial institutions alleging violations of the Fair Housing and Equal Credit Opportunity Acts and racial discrimination.

Unlike other pending lawsuits that seek monetary damages on behalf of individual borrowers, the NAACP lawsuits seek to change mortgage lending industry behaviors.

So what did the NAACP get? Wells Fargo endorsed the NAACP’s “Banking Principles on Fairness and Lending.”

Jealous said:

We brought these lawsuits against lenders to change and stop patterns of racial discrimination and other mortgage lending behaviors that have shattered American lives, families, and neighborhoods. We developed the NAACP banking principles to ensure that our country moves toward higher rates of sustainable homeownership. We commend Wells Fargo for taking a leadership role by being the first to embrace our principles, and hope this effort becomes a model for collaborating with other financial institutions.

Query: how will the NAACP enforce the agreement?

Jon Campbell, Wells Fargo’s executive vice president for social responsibility, told the New York Times it will be a while before there’s any change in their lending practices:

But now we have a partner, and we can look at ourselves through their lens. Will there be tweaks? We hope so.

So that’s what the NAACP got? Hope.

The NAACP is headquartered in Baltimore. On the same day the civil rights organization dropped its lawsuit, the City of Baltimore filed an amended federal complaint accusing Wells Fargo of steering blacks into subprime mortgages.

City Solicitor George Nilson said:

Our purpose in bringing this lawsuit remains the same as it always has been. We intend to expose Wells Fargo’s illegal, discriminatory practices to the light of day in a court of law. We want to make sure Wells Fargo reforms its lending practices, and takes specific, constructive steps to assist the City in repairing the damage caused by the many unnecessary foreclosures its irresponsible practices caused.

Fast forward to yesterday. I visited the NAACP’s website to confirm the dates of its annual convention. I nearly spilled my coffee when I saw this banner.

 

While no money changed hands on April 7, Wells Fargo is now a “lead sponsor” of the NAACP’s 101st annual convention.

Less than two weeks ago, Jealous participated in the “Measuring the Movement” national leadership forum. The air was filled with talk of holding “everyone accountable from government to our own institutions.”

Will the NAACP be held accountable for its relationship with a predatory lender?

Or was all the talk more hot air?